[dannypgh]

Completely reasonable. I think wealth is almost always created by communities and not individuals, so I'm skeptical of the idea of anyone being purely "self made."

I am willing to concede there is a common definition of the term that is less strict. However I've never heard a definition of the term where a millionaire by birth is "self-made."

[adventured]

If all Bill Gates had ever accomplished is that he inherited a million dollar trust fund - if that's all his life had amounted to, living off of that fund, growing that fund - then your argument would have merit. As it is, your argument is about as far away from meritorious as one can be. Your argument attempts to rob Gates of his accomplishment due to the conditions of his birth, it's an extremely dark argument that if applied to the human race would mean that nobody ever deserves individual credit for anything.

[dannypgh]

How did I attempt to rob Gates of his accomplishment? I'm not ascribing any value judgment to not being self-made.

I think those who think he is self-made clearly have a different definition of the term. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-made_man

"The appellation 'self-made man' or 'self-made woman' describes a person who was born poor or otherwise disadvantaged, but who achieved great economic success thanks to their own hard work and ingenuity rather than to any inherited fortune, family connections or other privilege."

Bill Gates was born with inherited fortune, family connections, and privilege. He was not born poor. That's not his fault any more than it's a poor child's fault that their parents are poor. But it is a fact.

A million bucks of wealth, with a conservative safe withdrawal rate of 3%, entitles you to $30k a year. This puts you in the 30th percentile of household income. That's not luxurious, but for zero work at all that's a much better outcome than someone who was born with nothing not working at all. A million in the bank puts you in the 96.3rd percentile of wealth in the US.

Say what you want about Bill Gates and his accomplishments, that doesn't change the fact he was born into wealth and inherently disqualified from being able to claim to be "self-made."